One of the mysteries of nature, solved just a few years ago,
involved the mouthpart or beak of the ordinary octopus. This is
the hardest substance in the animal's body, and it is the ONLY
hard substance in the animal's body. Any hole that the beak can
fit through, the entire octopus can fit
through. But how is that
beak attached to the octopus, such that it doesn't rip directly
free
from otherwise-soft tissues? See the squid-beak link for details;
the answer applies to the octopus, too.

The Idea here is that we apply that answer to the realm of
denture-manufacturing, and do it inexpensively by using 3D
printing technology, in the following generic way.

First we laser-scan the patient's mouth, to determine the
precise
shape the dentures need to be, to fit perfectly. Dentures are
traditionally expensive because each has to be unique; every
mouth is different in its fine details.

Next, we feed that data to a 3D printer, with a very soft plastic
as its "stock" for making stuff. For the purposes of this
presentation, I'm going to talk about tenth-millimeter
increments,
in terms of layers of plastic --3D printers can actually make
things using finer layers than that, and in practice we might
really
need to do denture-manufacturing with finer layers.

The first layer, with that very-soft plastic, is the layer that
will
directly contact the gums in the mouth of the patient, and
which
must fit perfectly on one side. (This layer might need to be
thicker than 1/10 mm; more on this later.) On the
other
side, we can start to balance-out the bumps and depressions.

The next layer uses a slightly harder plastic, and of course must
fit the first layer precisely, but doesn't need to fit the gums of
the patient. We can even-out the bumps and depressions some
more.

Repeat for a few more layers, of increasingly-hard plastic. We
should now have a pretty-even layer, upon which to build the
teeth of the dentures.

Using the hardest plastic of the sequence, all the layers needed
to
construct the teeth are built up. When done, the overall
denture
construction can be removed from the printer, cleaned, and the
patient might
be
able to start wearing it immediately.

Note that one of the other features of octopus biology is the
"sucker", of which there are very-many on its tentacles. This
very-soft biological substance can firmly grip things, and the
design of the sucker was the inspiration for human devices that,
for example, are attached to toy darts and shot from toy guns
(link).

If that first perfectly-fitting layer of softest plastic, in the
construction of these
dentures, is pliable enough, it should be able to vacuum-stick to
the gum-regions of the
mouth
without need of any ordinary denture adhesive.

This could, possibly, work. What you've got going
for you is the fact that the teeth are constantly
getting pressed against the gums when biting. So,
even though the suction effect will leak, it'll be
pressed back into place with each bite.

I think the only problem would be if you kept your
mouth open for a while - the suction would leak,
and your teeth might fall out.

The other problem would be wear and tear on the
soft layer. Conventional denture glue (I think)
effectively plays the part of this flexible layer, but
is replaced daily.

Incidentally, the squid's beak is actually formed from
what were once ear-bones (evolutionarily speaking).
This is a curious evolutionary turn, since the
mammalian ear-bones evolved from what were once
jaw-bones in our reptilian ancestors.

With the newest 3d printing [link] you wouldn't need layering. The mesh from rubbery to solid would feel much more natural.

\\the squid's beak is actually formed from what were once ear-bones (evolutionarily speaking). This is a curious evolutionary turn, since the mammalian ear-bones evolved from what were once jaw-bones in our reptilian ancestors.\\

Hard to tell if you're pulling-a-leg or not, but I find it fascinating that our enlarged braincase supposedly came about because of an early hominid born, (nurtured until sexually able, and then reproduced) with a malformed jaw which became a dominant trait.With modern humans there is a direct correlation between people experiencing temperomandibular joint syndrome and tinnitus resulting in an intermittent or constant ringing in the ears.